What ‘morons’ mentioned the Q word? They’d be the smart Libs trying to save their party

There is no single word more certain to create a deep schism within the Liberals than quotas. And there is nothing more likely to aggravate many in the party than a petition calling for quotas. So it follows that some party members, such as former federal vice-president and Sky After Dark regular Teena McQueen, had conniptions when such a petition was launched.

According to three Liberal women, it was McQueen who once joked that she “would kill to be sexually harassed” as the party reckoned with its treatment of women. Last week, McQueen posed this question in relation to the quotas petition: “What absolute moron is behind this?”

Liberal Party vice-president Teena McQueen is said to be paid about $400 every time she appears on Sky News.Credit: Sky News

Those “morons” – plural – would be NSW Liberal Women’s Council president Berenice Walker, vice president Adelaide Cuneo, former NSW minister Rob Stokes and his wife, Sophie, and Charlotte Mortlock, executive director of Hilma’s Network, which was established to boost female representation in the Liberals.

To date, some 500-plus people have signed the petition, which pleads: “If we do all want more women in parliament, then we must stop the preoccupation with theory, rhetoric and excuses, and accelerate this historic change.” Notably, one of the signatories is Manly MP James Griffin. He is the only senior NSW frontbencher to publicly put his name to the quotas push.

It was a bold move for Griffin. Only a fortnight earlier, NSW Opposition Leader Mark Speakman made his position clear. “I don’t think we need quotas at the moment in the Liberal Party,” he told the Herald in an interview before his budget reply speech. Speakman noted that his state parliamentary party was close to reaching gender parity.

That is worth celebrating, sure. And it’s a damn sight better than the federal Liberal position: just six of the 43 Liberal MPs to sit in the House of Representatives will be women. It must be noted, however, that the improved representation of women in the NSW parliament was achieved because former premier Dominic Perrottet intervened ahead of the last state election to stop the party running an all-male upper house ticket. Perrottet prevailed, and three male MPs were sacrificed to guarantee equal gender representation on the ticket.

(Perrottet did not, however, manage to win the fight over the northern beaches seat of Pittwater. He wanted a woman to run, but the party insisted on Rory Amon. Amon is now facing child sexual assault charges, which he denies, and the seat is in teal hands, won by Jacqui Scruby in a byelection.)

The decision of Griffin, widely viewed as the most likely leadership rival to Speakman, to sign the petition creates an obvious divide between him and his leader. Griffin’s take is: “Quotas are not a compromise on merit; they’re a practical response to a system that needs improvement.”

“Voters don’t care about our internal mechanics,” Griffin correctly points out, “but they care about whether we reflect their community and sound like a team ready to govern in their best interests.”

His position, as an ambitious Millennial hoping to be premier one day, is not surprising. What is surprising, however, is that others less tone-deaf than McQueen (who made a name for herself on the ABC’s now-defunct Q+A after a car-crash performance in which she attacked Muslims and praised Donald Trump) still can’t recognise that it’s time to modernise a party that has no idea what it stands for.

With the NSW division under the control of a new management committee headed by party elder and former premier Nick Greiner, quotas must be a key consideration. This is not about navel-gazing. Quotas, of course, would not be a top-order priority for voters, but nothing else has worked for the party when it comes to reflecting broader Australia. The federal election result demonstrates this clearly.

The federal Coalition did not only lose because of a lack of female candidates. That is too simplistic. But it could not possibly have won in May, nor could it in the future, when Australian women are deserting the party, and that is not only because of candidate choice. Policies, or lack thereof, played a major part.

Berenice Walker, one of McQueen’s “morons”, is new to the quotas push. Like many Liberals, she did not support such interventions, but she has changed her tune. Walker, who is also on the NSW management committee, says “for the first time, there is open dialogue across the party about increasing women’s participation among our volunteers and parliamentary party”. She credits federal Opposition Leader Sussan Ley’s recent address to the National Press Club, where she called herself a “zealot” about action to recruit more women to the Liberal ranks.

The Liberals’ NSW division had the indignity of a federal takeover forced upon it last year after its humiliating failure to nominate 140 candidates for local government elections. Under its new management committee, which has nine months to rebuild the broken party, it could re-emerge as the modern exemplar of the Liberals. To achieve this, it must ignore the antiquated squeals from McQueen and co and try something new. Quotas would be the best start.

Alexandra Smith is state political editor.

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